In any network environment, forwarding of data traffic is critical since it impacts numerous performance metrics (e.g., throughput, delay, reliability, etc.). In a layer two network, network devices may forward traffic based on media access control (MAC) addresses. For example, a layer two device (e.g., a bridge) may build a MAC address forwarding table as traffic flows through the network. In a typical case, a layer two device may receive an incoming packet that includes source and destination MAC addresses. The layer two device may copy the source address to the MAC address forwarding table along with the port from which the packet arrived. The layer two device may forward packets based on the learned network topology. A protocol (e.g., Spanning Tree Protocol (STP), Rapid Spanning Tree Protocol (RSTP), or Multiple Spanning Tree Protocol (MSTP)) may be employed to help prevent looping, provide redundancy, and afford least cost path forwarding.
During the operation of a network, however, numerous events may arise that impact the forwarding of packets by a layer two device. For example, a layer two port may suddenly go down which may cause traffic to be lost. For example, a linecard in the layer two device may forward packets to the disabled layer two port because the linecard is unaware of the disabled port and relies on forwarding information stored in its MAC address forwarding table. In such an instance, the packets will be lost.
Existing mechanisms for addressing these type of events include flushing the MAC address/port association from the MAC address forwarding tables in each linecard. However, such mechanisms tend to be slow in performance in comparison to the speed of traffic flow. For example, such mechanisms may utilize the resources of a control plane of the layer two device, thereby reducing performance speed.